1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to electronic musical instruments, in particular to keyboard type electronic musical instruments which have a keyboard as a performance instruction input device.
2. Prior Art
Conventional keyboard-type electronic musical instruments are known which have a tone control parameter setting function for divided key ranges. In this type of instrument, the keys of the keyboard are divided into several key ranges each including a plurality of keys, and tone control parameters can be set for each key range. There are first and second types of the keyboard-type electronic musical instrument having tone control parameter setting function for divided key ranges as follows:
(1) In the first type instrument, parameter designation operational members for designating tone control parameters are provided for every key range in a redundant manner. A tone control parameter is entered through the operation for one of the parameter designation operational members, which corresponds to the desired key range, the entered parameter is set to the key range corresponding to the operated member. PA1 (2) In the second type instrument, parameter designation operational members for designating tone control parameters are commonly provided for all key ranges, and a key range designation operational member is provided. Performance parameters entered through the operation of the parameter designation operational members are set to the key range which is designated by the key range designation operational member. PA1 a division point designator for designating at least one division point dividing the keys of the keyboard into a plurality of key ranges; a parameter inputter for inputting a desired tone control parameter; and a parameter assigner for selecting one of the key ranges which is determined based on a key range including a key which has been operated, and for assigning the input tone control parameter for the musical tone generation of the musical tones corresponding to the selected key range.
However, the first type electronic musical instruments have a problem in that they need an extremely large area for providing parameter designation operational members for every key range. The second type electronic musical instruments have a problem in that it is difficult to set the tone control parameter rapidly because the performer should operate the key range designation operational member to designate the desired key range before operating the parameter designation operational members: specifically, it is extremely difficult to designate the tone control parameters during performance.